This edition of Countdown to Training Camp takes a look at second year running back Tyjae Spears. Tyjae was one of the few bright spots for the Titans offense last season that was otherwise found stuck in second gear. As the season went on Spears saw his touches increase substantially as he learned to gather his footing in a Derrick Henry led backfield.

This offseason saw a lot of changes in the Titans offensive line and backfield. To start, former Cowboys bell-cow Tony Pollard was added early in FA along with top center available Lloyd Cushenberry. Post FA the Titans spent their top pick on Left Tackle JC Latham after dealing with a revolving door at LT the past two years. Each of the previously stated acquisitions will play a huge role in determing how effective the Titans offense can be this season.

All-in-all Spears had a very successful rookie years as he mostly played situationally. Spears gained 453 yards on 100 rushing attempts with 2 TDs. Through the air Spears gained 385 yards on 52 catches and had 1 TD. In total Spears’s gained 838 yards from scrimmage and touched the ball over 150 times with 3 total TDs.

Spears will no-doubt be splitting carries with Tony Pollard in a 1A and 1B type of situation. This will be a precarious situation to monitor as the season goes on how Coach Brian Callahan utilizes both running backs. Either way the Titans have a good to great situation at running back with both running backs on the roster.

To examine and project Tyjae Spears’s stat line we’ll examine a few things:

1. New OL will help

2. Brian Callahan’s offensive philosophy

3. Spears’s growth in year 2

Frist

The Titans went through a dramatic change from left to right on the OL. Last year as the Titans started the season they opened with the following starters on the offensive line: Andre Dilliard, Peter Skoronski, Aaron Brewer, Daniel Brunskill, and Chris Hubbard. Contrast that offensive line now with: JC Latham, Peter Skoronksi, Lloyd Cushenberry, Saahdiq Charles, and Leroy Watson/NPF (?). At least on paper the Titans have a substantially better offensive line than last year. Repeatedly last year Derrick Henry was barely able to get past the line of scrimmage without being contacted. Last year was Henry’s worst year running the ball since he became a starter as he only averaged 2 yards before contact.

This year the Titans should see a stark contrast in the running game from last year. This offensive line should be one of the best offensive lines of the last two to three years for the Titans, in part, due to a somewhat competent left tackle. Although Latham is still a rookie with much to prove, he has the tutelage of Bill Callahan to get him ready for the season.

Bill Callahan is probably the most important piece for the OL as a whole. There hasn’t been an offensive line that has regressed with Bill Callahan at the onset of his arrival. It’s fair to say that Callahan will have a large impact on 2nd year guard Peter Skoronski, veterans Lloyd Cushenberry, and Saahdiq Charles. The interior OL should be one of the strongest groups for the Titans. The interior OL is the most import part of the OL as a whole. It starts with the center who makes the calls to the rest of the OL and both guards left and right are responsible for both the A and B gaps in conjunction with the center. Most runs generally — in any offense— go from B-gap to B-gap. Amid much hype Peter Skoronski last year wasn’t all most had hoped he’d be after being selected 11th overall. PFF gave Skoronski at 58.6 overall run block rating. His best games came week 1 with an 80.1 grade and only ever went to above average twice more as he dealt with appendicitis and working his way back from that. Skoronski was ranked as the 42nd best run blocking guard in the NFL according to PFF. That’s not too bad when you factor in two guards per team. However, I think the best news to take from that is there is room for improvement. Whereas, Lloyd Cushenberry ranked 14th in run blocking grade with a solid grade of 72.4. Saahdiq Charles on the other hand ranked 54th in the league. It’s interesting to note that Charles has been getting the majority of reps over Brunskill who actually ranked as one of the top 25 guards in the league.

The switch from Charles to Brunskill is interesting to note. Since Bill Callahan came to Tennessee the Titans added several offensive lineman thru trade or free agency. It appears that Callahan — rightfully so — has remade this Titans offensive line group in his image…hallelujah! The new look OL should give Tyjae Spears plenty of room to work with. However, I wouldn’t expect things to gel quickly for the line because as many as 4/5 starters on the OL may be first time starters with the Titans with only Skoronski as the lone Titan from 2023. If the Titans can block well upfront or even be average Spears should see more room to roam when he gets the ball. Spears averaged 4.5 ypc. With the improvements to the OL Spears should see less time getting hit in the backfield or near the LOS and more time exploding through the line which should increase his ypc .1 or even .2 more than his rookie year.

Second

The offensive philosophy will probably be the most important item to analyze as it pertains to Spears’s stats in 2024. Coach (Brian) Callahan’s offensive philosophy is certainly more pass heavy than the Titans of old. The Bengals offense passed the ball nearly two-thirds of the time compared the 2023 Titans which was closer to 60/40 Pass:Run respectively. This doubly hurts Tyjae Spears and here’s why. Tyjae will supposedly split every single carry with Pollard and thus will probably have around 50% of all carries in an offense that might seek to run the ball 30% of the time. Increasingly — this past offseason — the Titans have garnered a completely new set of pass catchers with the additions of Calvin Ridley, Tyler Boyd, and Tony Pollard. Those additions will split the target share substantially versus last year when the Titans leading receivers were Hopkins, Chig, and Spears in that order. Those additions will split the target share substantially versus last year when the Titans leading receivers were Hopkins, Chig, and Spears in that order. Realistically the order should go something like this in terms of # of targets:

1. Ridley

2. Hopkins

3. Boyd

4. Chig

5. Pollard/Tyjae

Already Spears should find himself 2 to 3 spots below last year in target share. That could have a devastating affect on his reception total this year. The Titans find themselves in a somewhat similar situation as the Bengals in terms of available targets. With the Bengals top 3 receiving leaders of Chase, Higgins, and Boyd, that left RB Joe Mixon with the 4th most targets with 62. In comparison, Spears had 67 targets last year as the third leading receiver. Assuming the Titans run 1000 offensive plays next year there should be around 610 pass attempts to around 370 rushing attempts in keeping with an estimated 63:37 Pass:Run ratio. However, as stated before, if the Titans are to be splitting carries with 1A and 1B Tyjae and Tony Pollard that could take Spears’s rushing attempts down to close to 185. We’ll use that 185 number for Spears’s total rushing touches. In addition, to make life simple, we’ll dole out 60 targets (being generous) of 630 attempts to Spears. With his catch rate he should accumulate somewhere between 45-50 receptions. In this instance we’ll take the average and give Spears 50 receptions for next year. Last year Spears averaged 7.4 ypc(atch). Spears ranked 11th in the NFL with a 7.4 ypc for RB’s with >45 targets according to PFF. Spears ranked 2nd in YPC behind only Bijan Robinson in the NFL for all rookie RB’s with at least 45 targets. For this projection we’ll keep Spears’s ypc at 7.4 which isn’t too far from Joe Mixon’s 7.2 ypc last year in Brian Callahan’s offense.

Third

Tyjae Spears should see plenty of growth in his second year in the NFL. After playing mostly on 3rd down and obvious passing downs Spears’s role should be much more consistent — although he’ll split time with Pollard — than last year where Henry got the bulwark of the offensive rushing production. Whereas, Spears had most of the passing game production for the running back position. If you look back historically running backs in their second year do fairly well. James Cook in 2022 had 507 yards rushing and 180 yards receiving. Fast forward to year two and that increased to 1122 rushing yards and 445 yards receiving. Isaih Pacheco is another example from the same draft class. Pacheco in his rookie year ran for 830 yards and had 130 yards receiving. In his 2nd year he increased his totals to 930 yards rushing and 244 yards receiving. Those are just a few of the most recent examples. Last year Spears had 453 yards on the ground and 385 yards receiving. Spears will look to improve on those numbers while sharing around 50% of the running back workload.

Spears nearly had 1/3 of Henry’s carries (100 to 280) and a little under half (52 to 28) of Henry’s receptions. Safe to say that in Spears’s first year in the NFL he wasn’t a major focal point of the offense in comparison to his peer. With Spears (allegedly) scheduled to split carries and/or receptions evenly with Tony Pollard this year he will have a larger role in the offense as a whole.

Last year Spears had 3 total TD’s, 2 rushing and 1 receiving. I don’t expect that number to jump up too dramatically. As Henry took most of the bulk of the goal line carries last year I expect Pollard to do so this year. Pollard is much better built to get into the end zone in goal line situations with 15 more lbs and 2 inches more in height than Spears.

The Math

1. I estimated the Titans will have 370 run plays and Spears should have around 185 carries

2. The Titans are estimated to have around 630 pass attempts so we can ascertain that Spears will receive 50 of them

3. Spears’s yards per catch should be close to the same as last year so we’ll keep it at 7.4

4. Spears’s yards per carry should increase to 4.6 or 4.7 but we’ll use the 4.6 number to shy on the side of caution.

Tyjae Spears (2024): 185 carries 851 yards rushing, 50 receptions and 370 yards receiving and 5 total TD’s

In aggregate those are pretty solid numbers for Spears as he head into his second year in the NFL. The Titans should be able to get Spears the ball more than last year and see how he builds upon his impressive rookie year heading into year two.

What’s Next?

Titans training camp officially begins this week. There are as many questions as there are answers to many of the Titans issues from last year to this year. The Titans will need to figure out those answers in a little over a month before their first game on September 8th.